Chapter I: Front Matter

Obscure origin of Hakes and Gordons 3

III.

My sister and my brother—Mischief, a sign of health in
children—Friendship, a graft that can only be made while we are
growing 6

IV.

My aunt Wallinger—My vivid memory—Our relations in Yorkshire,
the Rimington family—My mother’s uncles, the Clarkes 8

V.

The Clarkes and the Pollocks—William Clarke a governor of St.
Paul’s and of Christ’s Church Schools—He gave Sir Frederick
Pollock a presentation to the one and me to the other. My first
school-days at Hertford, and how after measles and scarlet
fever I was sent home in order to die 11

VI.

My rapid recovery and return to mischief after my illness,
and the brutal treatment I received from the boys while I was
falling sick 15

VII.

From school to Seaford for the holidays, spent by me and my
cousin, a Shore, with the Wallingers—The rotten borough, its
owners and surroundings—My aunt Shore, a sister of my mother,
and the Shore family—Mrs. Wallinger’s despotic kindness to her
nephews—Our Denton cousins, the Gwynnes—The Reverend William
Gwynne and his lady, also my mother’s sister 17

VIII.

The Gwynne family—Character of Mrs. Gwynne, and of her
husband—The training of their offspring 21

IX.

My monastic life in London—The cloisters, the dormitories, the
playground—The influence of their history on the boyish mind—I
am ordered to fight 24

X.

Influence of Shakespeare and Virgil over me—“Cozing” after
bed-time; story-telling; the reading of forbidden books; the
novels of the past; the new novel now worn out—The great
epochs, all of a transitory duration, except that of religion 27

XI.

The classical masters—The dress of the clergy—The writing
masters—The lower officials—steward, beadles—No teaching except
Greek, Latin, writing and arithmetic. Religion not taught, only
heard 30

XII.

On bishop, priests, and deacons 34

XIII.

Henry William Gordon, my uncle, mixes his blood with that of
Enderby, whence sprang a giant of middle stature, Chinese
Gordon 36

XIV.

My last holiday spent in the mediæval city of Exeter—The
dead weight of the clergy relieved by Yates acting
Falstaff—Professor Shelden and his mummy—Squire Northmore and
his great discovery—Gifford and his Mastership of the Rolls 39

XV.

Lifelong friendships, their physiology—The king’s
ward—Games—Handsome boys, and others 43

XVI.

Boys of some mark—Christ’s unrevisited—Life at
Woolwich—Drawing-room manners—Colonel Wylde—Soldiers the best
servants 47

XVII.

Seaford revisited—The Wallinger family—A domestic seaside
season of relatives and friends not unknown to fortune 50

XVIII.

Vaulting ambition, a retrospect—Gravitation of my mother
from west to south—She settled at Lewes—My intellect, dieted
on its sense of nothingness, takes growth—The process of
brain-culture, and its accessories 53

XIX.

Youth—Our first recognition of Nature as something more than
ourselves—My modesty always in proportion to my ignorance—My
early habit of pumping those who knew more than myself—A
country town, a cemetery in which great men are buried
alive—Gideon Mantell, prince of geologists—Sir John Shelley
and Sir George Shiffner, the last of the pigtail wearers—They
represent Lewes in those Tory times 56

XX.

A county town has many mansions, in which the small succeed
to the great—Mantell, surgeon-apothecary: his struggles—Lord
Egremont’s bounty—He removes to Brighton, sells his museum,
vanishes again—The liberality of Government to art, but not to
science—Minor celebrities of Lewes 59

XXI.

I become a student of medicine under Thomas Hodson, a great
operator—The superior skill of the surgeon, who knows exactly
what he is about—Hodson’s strange character—His pre-eminence
in county practice—Glynde, Lord Hampden, John Ellman, and
south-down mutton 62

XXII.

John Ellman, a sketch—The south-down sheep not extinct—Lord
Hampden’s funeral—Southover—The three weird sisters—My studies
continued in London at St. George’s—Dr. Thomas Young, the
greatest of theorists 65

XXIII.

The order of physicians—Halford, Warren, Chambers—The heavy
costs of getting to the front of the profession—The difference
between the old and new physicians, how brought about—Dr.
James Clark made master of the situation—I become a pupil of
Faraday, the eminent lecturer of the day—Family deaths and
changes—St. George’s Hospital in the olden time 68

XXIV.

In due course I proceeded to Edinburgh to visit the Scotch
Universities—I made the acquaintance, on board the steamer,
of a “young fellow”—Dr. Greville, the botanist: his great
work on the _Cryptogamia_—Dr. Robert Knox, whose calling
and whose hobby were one—His enthusiasm and geological
foresight—Physic is seldom a hobby—Aberdeen and Principal
Jack—St. Andrew’s—Glasgow College and its professors 72

XXV.

The Glasgow theatre and Edmund Kean—A tour to the lochs and
bens with my brother—Wrote poetry, sent it to Sir Walter Scott
on the chance of his being an Edmund Burke—Poetry and its
patrons in the past—What a poet is for: _nascitur, non fit_ 75

XXVI.

Breadalbane Castle—Hospitality in the shepherd’s cot—We
traverse Loch Long, we become footpads—My brother returns
southwards, I remain at Glasgow to pursue my studies—I graduate
there—Impressions of Scotch character 79

XXVII.

A retrospect through a long avenue of time to when studies
were no longer compulsory—A sixty years’ view—Taking stock
of my knowledge—I feel the want of foreign languages—I
return to London, and my next important step is to visit
Italy—Calais—Paris—Colonel de Courcy—Geneva—The Simplon—Milan
81

XXVIII.

Styles and stylists—Why no author has described a perfect
gentleman or a perfect lady—The temporary gentleman—Ladies
in high office not to flirt, ugliness essential to their
success—Women mistresses of the nervous style of writing—The
muscular style best suited to men—The scientific style a good
model 85

XXIX.

Nature is the only true stylist; I take my first lesson
of her on the summit of the Alps—The English then in
Florence—Landor—Trelawny—Colonel Burdett—Bankhead 90

XXX.

William IV. and Queen Adelaide—Sir William Martens—The
Marchioness of Waterford—Sir Herbert Taylor—Sir Andrew
Buchanan; anecdote of the Court 95

XXXI.

Brighton; a string of anecdotes 96

XXXII.

The Earl of Elgin my friend—His marbles—He was a great
and patient sufferer from _tic douleureux_—Hahnneman and
homœopathy—The earl’s amiable family—Mr. Bruce, the ambassador
at Pekin—Lady Elgin and the ladies Charlotte and Augusta
Bruce—The earl’s first family—The next Earl of Elgin—My drama,
called the “Piromides” 99

XXXIII.

A tirade on friendships—Sir David Scott at Brighton—His
interview with George IV.—A passage of snuffs 101

XXXIV.

The Countess de Montalembert; her versatility—Strange effect
on the understanding when those who were in full vigour on our
last seeing them, grow feeble and die—The Rev. H. M. Wagner—His
labours—Horace Smith—Dr. George Hall—The Smith family—Evening
receptions of Lady Carhampton and of the Hon. Mrs. Mostyn, a
daughter of Thrale 106

XXXV.

The human race not purposed to be very intellectual—The
clergy interpolate Nature with dogma—Count Pepoli, professor
of Italian at University College—His opera of “I Puritani,”
written for Bellini—He was robbed and exiled by Pius IX., who
did not set the Tiber on fire, hard as he tried to astonish
feeble minds—Sir Matthew Tierney—Dr. Bankhead and the other
king’s physicians at Brighton 111

XXXVI.

The charm of Brighton in the olden time before railways—The
“Age” coach—Sir St. Vincent Cotton and the Marquis of
Worcester—The Dispensary, the Sussex County Hospital, and its
noble patrons—Essay on manners—The dandy—The triumph of the
cigar over women—Essay on vanity—Vain to the last—Addison—Vain
in death—The least vain of men is the suicide—His anomalous
character portrayed—Too systematic to be insane—His courage
inscrutable 116

XXXVII.

There is no such thing as merit; it is not boastful in any
man to describe his own capabilities correctly—Delinquencies
most objected to by delinquents—Those who try to define
genius are too clever to succeed—Being a little less clever
myself, I give its definition—If I appear too clever at any
time, the corrective is close at hand—My early exertions—The
enormous increase of good writing in the country—Criticism the
profoundest of studies 122

XXXVIII.

Liars, their division into three classes—No man is truly
great unless a love of truth places his mind parallel
with nature—Its immense use in criticism—A new criticism
discoverable in Shakespeare on this basis, illustrated by three
parallels—Nature’s mysterious number—Shakespeare’s thirty-third
sonnet—Coleridge’s “Time, Real and Imaginary”—His “Work without
Hope”—The three parallels rarely found except in authors of the
highest genius 126

XXXIX.

Wordsworth tried and found wanting—The parables of the
Lord examined and found absolutely free from metaphor—The
poetic mind never fully matures—The Fame Insurance Company’s
proceedings—Shakespeare a master of simplicity, and
comparatively free from metaphor, which is not strictly
sincere—The Prodigal Son and the Ten Virgins, perfect
models—Milton’s style magnificent and insincere—The
retrospective and prospective imagination of the parables; the
introspective only belongs to the poet who substitutes himself
for Nature, of whom he knows little 132

XL.

I spend a year in Paris, then take up my residence in London,
publishing work there in 1839—I resolve on country life,
and settle down at Bury St. Edmunds—The residents there—Its
celebrated school, where a bishop of London, a lord chancellor,
and a president of the College of Physicians were educated,
and were still living—The Marquis of Bristol and Ickworth
Building—The singular history and will of the previous earl,
Bishop of Derry—An account of Ickworth—The unparalleled career
of the earl-bishop—The Hervey family 138

XLI.

Culture in the Suffolk families—Sir Henry Bunbury—His
character—The son of H. B., the eminent caricaturist and friend
of Sir Joshua Reynolds—Barton Hall: among several of Reynolds’s
works there is Venus sacrificing to the Graces, a full length
portrait of Lady Sarah Lennox, wife of Sir Charles Bunbury, and
the most famous beauty of her day—Her after marriage to the
Hon. Colonel Napier, and she becomes the mother of a family of
heroes—The Napier family—The second Lady Bunbury, a daughter
of Lady Sarah, marries Sir Henry; and Cecilia Napier, her
grand-daughter, marries his son, Colonel Bunbury—Sir Henry’s
mission to Bonaparte—Sir George Napier—Sir Charles, the hero of
Scinde—Sir Charles Fox Bunbury married to Miss Horner, sister
of Lady Lyell 147

XLII.

The Duke of Norfolk; his simple life—The Earl of Surrey—Lord
Fitzalan, who marries Admiral Lyons’ daughter—The beneficent
character of that lady—The family seat of Fornham All
Saints sold to a Lord Manners—Hengrave Hall and Sir Thomas
Gage—Culford, formerly the seat of the Cornwallis family, then
of Mr. Benyon de Beauvoir and his nephew 152

XLIII.

The Wilsons of Stowlangtoft—Their circle—Samuel Rickards,
rector of the parish, and the Tractarians, Newman, Manning—Sir
John Yarde Buller—Sir Richard Kindersley—The Porchers—Mrs.
Henry Wilson, daughter of Lord Charles Fitz-Roy; her admirable
character—A dinner at Trinity College, Cambridge—Kindersley,
Professor Sedgwick, and Dr. Donaldson—Henry Wilson’s generous
character—Anecdote of Sir George Wombwell, former owner of
Stowlangtoft—The Thornhills of Riddlesworth—The character of
Rickards; his charming wife—The death of friends 155

XLIV.

The Rickardses at home—Miss Rickards paints and glazes new
windows for the church—The Rev. Mr. Mozley, a Tractarian and
a writer on the _Times_ paper—A _Times_ Commissioner—Lord
Thurlow—The Oakes family of Newton Court—Great Saxham Hall and
the Mills family—Barrow rectory; the Rev. Arthur Carrighan; his
remarkable history—Mrs. Mills; her daughters—George Borrow 160

XLV.

Borrow’s contradictory character—His fine person; Mr. Murray’s
portrait of him—As my guest he accompanies me to a dinner at
Sir Thomas Cullum’s—The party present—Borrow and Thackeray the
lions—Milner Gibson—Borrow accompanies me to a dinner at Mr.
Bevan’s, a truly awkward occasion for all parties—Anecdote of
Borrow and Miss Agnes Strickland, told me by Mr. J. W. Donne,
the Censor 164

XLVI.

Charles Buller, the pet of the House of Commons, secretary
to Lord Durham in Canada, and one of a Whig clique, himself
a charming person—The parsonage of Rickards on the whole the
best literary centre—Hospitality of Riddlesworth Hall—Lord
Sandwich there; anecdote of his father-in-law, the Marquis
of Anglesey—Colonel Keppel, the late Earl of Albemarle; his
charm of manner—One misses the society of one’s own class in
high circles, but there are many compensations—The decline of
influence in men of rank as well as of position—Mrs. Thornhill,
a daughter of Mrs. Waddington, and sister of Moncton Milnes—Our
parishes, with their resident squires, like happy republics—The
Newtons of Elvedon and Duleep Singh—The Duke of Grafton and
Euston Hall—Mr. Angerstein; his family and their princely home
in Norfolk 168

XLVII.

The clergy of Bury—The Church the only profession in which
practitioners do not get their own living, being already
endowed—It will last their time—A parsonic anecdote 176

XLVIII.

The Cookesley family—Dr. Cookesley attacks Dr. Donaldson’s
work, “Jashar”—Donaldson, the head-master of Bury school, a man
of complicated character, governed by overweening vanity—He
wished to be the Christian Voltaire and the Bentley of his
day—The true origin of “Jashar” was Knights’s book on “Phallic
Worship” 180

XLIX.

Perowne’s attack on Donaldson, as champion of orthodoxy—A clear
line drawn between physics and metaphysics 184